Louisville City FC made it three wins from three to start the 2024 USL Championship season as the side scored five goals in a game for the first time in almost two years in a 5-0 victory against Birmingham Legion FC in front of a crowd of 8,974 fans at Lynn Family Stadium on Saturday afternoon.

Here are three things we took away from the action.

1. LOUISVILLE GETS THE JUMP

One of the challenges Louisville City FC faced a season ago was lacking tempo at the start of contests. The side only scored twice at home in the opening 15 minutes of games in the 2023 regular season, and only eight times overall in the first half. So far this season, that’s done a complete 180, and it’s a big reason why Louisville has three wins out of three to start a season once again.

LouCity was aggressive from the off against Legion on Saturday afternoon. It might have taken the lead in the fourth minute when Adrien Perez first had a chance blocked by Birmingham’s AJ Paterson before sending his second chance high, but in the 13th minute Jake Morris put the hosts ahead in clinical fashion from Taylor Davila’s cross and the hosts were moving. Louisville Head Coach Danny Cruz has talked about making Lynn Family Stadium a fortress again after last year’s middling home record. On the evidence of the past two weekends, it’s going to be one of the most difficult places to visit in the league this season.

2. WILSON HARRIS, MAN ON FIRE

Along with the rest of Louisville’s attack, Wilson Harris had by his standards a down season in 2023. Three games into the new campaign, that’s firmly in the rear-view mirror with the 24-year-old looking like his regular self as one of the most clinical finishers in the USL Championship. With four goals after Saturday’s brace, both cleanly taken inside the penalty area before he was removed with 18 minutes to play, Harris has become your early Golden Boot leader and looks primed for a massive campaign.

That’s big for both LouCity and Harris individually, who signed a new multi-year contract before entering a key season in his career this offseason. The pace he’s set so far this campaign of a goal every 44 minutes isn’t going to last all season – at least, we think it won’t – but Harris could be another player that at the end of the year is looking like a great attacking option for a club in Europe. If this season goes the way it’s trending, it could launch him to another level of competition in his prime.

3. BIRMINGHAM’S SEAMS CONTINUE TO SHRED

Legion got sent out with a strong halftime message from Head Coach Tom Soehn, who used a first-half substitution to bring off Tabort Etaka Preston for Moses Mensah to try and shore up his side defensively before adding Stefano Pinho to the front line at the break. It had the desired effect, at least in attack – Legion looked far sharper in the second half and was unfortunate not to find a consolation goal – but the defensive struggles the side has faced so far this season were once again on display for all to see.

Louisville consistently found space in the seams on the edges of the penalty area and to deliver good balls into the box as the Legion defense missed rotations or simply blanked on being touch-tight to Wilson Harris, which led to his two goals. There’s a long way to go this season, but these defensive challenges are not the sort that a postseason team is made of, and that will threaten Legion’s five-season playoff streak.